Fall & Winter Courses

Professional Biography

Nancy Lusignan Schultz, Ph.D.

Direct campus line: 978-542-6105

Nancy Lusignan Schultz joined the faculty of Salem State University in 1983. Her scholarship interrogates the intersection of literature, history, and religion. Schultz's expertise is in the history of U.S. Catholicism, American literature, and American Studies, and she has also done extensive work on the history of Salem, Massachusetts.

Her pedagogical research examines how students bridge transitions, from high school to the university, and from the university to graduate school, especially in the areas of reading, writing, and critical thinking.

Her administrative interests are in community-building, effective communication, and inspirational leadership.

She earned her B.A. from the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Massachusetts and her Ph.D. from Boston College.

Schultz is the author of the award-winning Fire and Roses: The Burning of the Charlestown Convent, 1834 (Free Press, 2000), and Mrs. Mattingly's Miracle: The Prince, the Widow, and the Cure that Shocked Washington City (Yale UP, 2011 and the reprint edition of 2014). Her newest book, with Beth L. Lueck and Sirpa Salenius, is Transatlantic Conversations: Nineteenth-Century American Women's Encounters with Italy and the Atlantic World, University of New Hampshire Press (December 2016). With Dane Anthony Morrison, she is the co-editor of Salem: Place, Myth, and Memory, now published in a second edition with updated preface (April 2015). She is also the editor of Fear Itself: Enemies Real and Imagined in American Culture (Purdue UP 1999) and Veil of Fear: Nineteenth Century Convent Tales by Rebecca Reed and Maria Monk (Purdue UP 1999).

Currently, she is working on an edition of the collected poems of Harriet Beecher Stowe.

Faculty Mentor, Center for Research and Creative Activities, AY13-14 and 14-15

Dean's Fellow, College of Arts and Sciences Dean’s Office, Salem State University, 2013-2014. Worked with the Dean of Arts and Sciences on professional development programs for faculty, including a new chair's training series, an initiative to support mid-career faculty, logistics and scheduling of first year seminars, and development of new interdisciplinary graduate programs from the College of Arts and Sciences.

English Department Chairperson, Salem State University, 2007-2013. Managed a department of 30 full time faculty, and 50+ adjuncts. Nearly doubled enrollment in the major to 300 students, and substantially increased departmental space and resources.

Coordinator of Graduate Studies in English & American Studies, Salem (MA) State College, 1999-2007. Coordinated M.A. and M.A.T. in English programs, and developed a dual M.A./M.A.T. degree. More than doubled enrollments in all programs to 100 matriculated students.

Writing Center co-director, Salem State College, 1984-2007

Honors and Awards

Outstanding First Year Advocate Award, Salem State University, April 14, 2014. One of two faculty chosen from a group of faculty and staff nominated by first-year students as having been important to their success during their first year at the university.

Outstanding Educator Award, Friends of the School of Education, Salem State University, May 2011

Elected to Phi Kappa Phi, Salem State University Chapter, 1999

Fellowships and Grants

Summer 2014 Research Grant ($4,000), A Guide to Writing in Graduate School, University Research Committee, School of Graduate Studies, Salem State University

Fall 2012 Mini-Grant ($1,000), funded conference travel to Italy, June 2013, University Research Committee, School of Graduate Studies, Salem State University

Ph.D. English and American Literature, Boston College, Chestnut Hill, MA

B.A. cum laude, English and French, College of the Holy Cross, Worcester MA

Additional study at McGill University and University of Paris, Sorbonne

World Languages

French, Italian, and German

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Professional Interests

Related Experience

Radio Guest, "Catholics in America," a production of BackStory with the American History Guys, a program of the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities, aired nationally on public radio stations, airing the week of September 20, 2015 in conjunction with the visit of Pope Francis to the United States.

Selected Publications

BOOKS:

Mastering It: A Guide to Writing in Graduate School, with Patricia Bloem and Elizabeth Kenney. In progress.

Transatlantic Conversations: Nineteenth-Century American Women's Encounters with Italy and the Atlantic World (edited collection) with Beth Lueck and Sirpa Salenius. Under contract with University Press of New England, December 2016.

Salem: Place, Myth, and Memory. Co-edited with Dane Morrison, (2nd paperback edition and e-book, with an updated preface), University Press of New England, March 2015; Northeastern UP, Spring 2004. Winner of National Prize: the 2005 Award of Merit from the American Association for State and Local History

Mrs. Mattingly's Miracle:The Prince, the Widow, and the Cure that Shocked Washington City, Yale University Press, Spring 2011. Paperback edition published February 2014.

Fire & Roses: The Burning of the Charlestown Convent, 1834 (1st paperback edition), Northeastern UP, 2002; Fire & Roses: The Burning of the Charlestown Convent, 1834. Free Press, 2000. Winner of the Lois Rudnick Book Prize from the New England American Studies Association for the best book by a member for 1999 and 2000 and Massachusetts Book Award Honors in Nonfiction.

Veil of Fear: Nineteenth Century Convent Captivity Narratives by Rebecca Reed and Maria Monk. Wrote general introduction for the Notabell Reprint Series, Purdue UP, September 1999.

Four entries, including "Prince Alexander Hohenlohe" and "Miraculée," for Miracles: An Encyclopedia of People, Places, and Supernatural Events from Antiquity to the Present. Edited by Patrick J. Hayes. ABC-CLIO, January 2016.

RECENT REVIEWS:

"Quakers and Abolition, edited by Brycchan Carey and Geoffrey Plank." Early American Literature 52.1. Forthcoming.

Invited Symposium Participant, “Religion in the Early Republic,” Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of American History, Washington, D.C., March 20, 2015

Presenter, “‘Pressed Flowers from Italy’: Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Italian Poems and the Aesthetic Lures of Catholicism.” Society of Historians of the Early American Republic Conference, Philadelphia, PA, July 19, 2014

Invited Keynote Speaker, "Fictions of Purity: Puritans, 'Native' Americans, and 'American' Identity." The 2015 Friedman Legacy Day Symposium: "Know-Nothings' Nativism, Catholic Education, and School Choice," sponsored by the Pioneer Institute, the Harvard Kennedy School Program on Education, Policy, and Governance, PACE, and the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, Friday, July 31, 2015

Invited Speaker, with Dane Morrison, "Salem: Place, Myth, and Memory," Friends and Family Weekend, Salem State University, October 4, 2015.

Invited Panelist, "How to Develop a Viable Research Plan," with Avi Chomsky and Joseph Buttner. Sponsored by the Center for Research and Creative Activities and the School of Graduate Studies, Fall 2015.

Invited Presenter, “Issues and Strategies: Support for Graduate Student Writing,” High Tea and Hot Topics, Graduate School Coordinators, School of Graduate Studies, Salem State University, January 12, 2015